The Woodring Monitor

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

VALENTINE'S DAY PARTY AT CAFE RACER- OH, MR. MAYOR!

Seattle's most luxurious hideout is having yet another of their legendary theme blasts on Thursday Feb 14. Yes, darling, you must come. Yes. What a love-feast it will be!

The walls will be freshly covered with love-art from the ever-industrious Friends of the Nib and other Cafe regulars; and there will be all the usual characters, drinking and laughing and feeling wonderful, and it will be ever so nice!

The art will be inexpensively priced to make fabulous last-minute valentine's day gifts; why, you can even pick up a glorious full-color hand-signed print of JESUS AND THE BEAR for the cash-and-carry price of $20( if you think you'd like one of these but can't make the party, drop me a line at jimwoodring(at)mindspring.com).

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

RETURN OF THE LOOTY

The redoubtable MAKE has posted its own instructions for the construction of contemptable LOOTY, the terrible toy. As their version is slightly different from mine and has what I consider to be a design flaw as regards the all-important admission of light, I am posting the above diagram along with a bad scan of an early ad for the device. WARNING: Looty-use may be harmful to your brain circuitry. Discontinue use and destroy device if reciprocal brain-looting leads to fatigue, hallucination, depression, , eyestrain, insomnia, paroniria, paranoia or paranormality.

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

NATURAL CURIOSITIES AT ROQ LA RUE FRIDAY FEB 8

Seattle's beloved Roq La Rue gallery unleashes a long-anticipated monster show of animal-themed art this Friday, February 8. "A Cabinet Of Natural Curiosities" is the show's title, and by all portents the vast space will be chockablock with eye-licking, mind-goosing wonders. BoingBoing's Mark Fruenfelder will have a picture there ("Synthetic Swan", above) and he provides further information and a link to the gallery's site, including an online preview of the multitude of works. It perhaps behooves me to mention that my pictures Jesus and the Bear and New Iron Age will be there as well. So load that flask, fire up the jalopy and hie ye to Belltown for more animal congress than you can shake a well-gnawed femur at.

Sunday, February 03, 2008

JESUS ON THE COVER OF POPULAR MECHANICS

As you can plainly see, the team that put together this speculative portrait of the Incarnation who was born 2008 years ago (about one-third of the earth's lifespan, according to Mike Huckabee) was guided by the same cosmic hand that collaborated on Jesus and the Bear. Gone are the golden tresses and pale Pre-Raphaelite skin; present are the long yogi's eyes and flat-tipped nose*, as described by Sri Ramakrishna**, to whom this speculative portrait bears more than a passing resemblance. Thus it is that science and mysticism, the Siamese twins of enlightenment, work side-by-side for the benefit of inquiring minds everywhere.

About Me

I was born in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains in Southern California and enjoyed an exciting childhood full of poetry and paroniria among the snakes, rats and tarantulas of that enchanted realm. I eventually grew into an inquisitive bearlike man who has had three exciting careers; garbage collector, merry-go-round-operator and cartoonist. Some of my work is collected in THE BOOK OF JIM, THE FRANK BOOK and SEEING THINGS (all published by Fantagraphics) and in various toys, fabrics, prints and urban legends. Thank you for your interest.